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How Construction Companies Are Increasing Safety, Productivity with Drones

Construction projects have a unique set of needs—and drones can help. One example of this is happening at D&T Excavation, an earthworks company serving commercial, residential and government agencies.

The company turned to technology for inventory management and worksite topographical analysis, which helps ensure the safety of its employees. In order to determine the best technology for the job, D&T Excavation conducted a comprehensive survey of available industrial drone options. Now the firm is using drones from Kespry.

Benefits of Drone Technology

With the drone technology in place, it is able to do inventory management and topographical analysis without putting staff in harm’s way. The drone technology is controlled by an operator, who can survey the area and set the flight parameters on an iPad.

Another benefit of the technology is that the company is able to keep customers informed about worksite project progress through the aerial intelligence platform’s analytics and reporting capabilities.

Future Capabilities of Drones

The good news is that drone technology continues to advance and there are many examples of how it will become more intelligent in the future.

For instance, Atlas RFID has been testing radio-frequency identification (RFID) technology on drones, which has now led the company to file for a patent for technology related to its drone-mounted radar. This was tested in partnership with Bechtel on a large-liquid natural gas processing facility.

The testing pilot consisted of a week of testing, as the drone-mounted RFID scanned the yards to identify location of equipment and materials. The results show a 56 percent reduction in sweep time and a 22 percent increase in location captures.

In the future, drone-mounted RFID reader technology can help improve the ability to locate and manage critical construction equipment and materials. For the construction jobsite, drones will continue to advance to ensure a safer worker.